[orig. by SF writer Bruce Bethke and/or editor Gardner Dozois] A
subgenre of SF launched in 1982 by William Gibson's epoch-making novel
Neuromancer (though its roots go back through Vernor
Vinge's True Names (see the Bibliography in Appendix C) to John
Brunner's 1975 novel The Shockwave Rider). Gibson's
near-total ignorance of computers and the present-day hacker culture
enabled him to speculate about the role of computers and hackers in the
future in ways hackers have since found both irritatingly naïve and
tremendously stimulating. Gibson's work was widely imitated, in particular
by the short-lived but innovative Max Headroom TV
series. See cyberspace, ice,
jack in, go flatline.

Since 1990 or so, popular culture has included a movement or fashion
trend that calls itself ‘cyberpunk’, associated especially with
the rave/techno subculture. Hackers have mixed feelings about this. On
the one hand, self-described cyberpunks too often seem to be shallow
trendoids in black leather who have substituted enthusiastic blathering
about technology for actually learning and doing it.
Attitude is no substitute for competence. On the other hand, at least
cyberpunks are excited about the right things and properly respectful of
hacking talent in those who have it. The general consensus is to tolerate
them politely in hopes that they'll attract people who grow into being true
hackers.